Hazrat Inayat Khan sometimes told the story of a westerner coming to a sage of China and asking to be taught the occult laws.  The sage, puzzled perhaps, or perhaps politely amused, said, “But we have so many missionaries from your country coming to us and teaching us about God.  Why do you ask this question?”  The westerner replied, “Oh, we know all about God, but I want to learn the occult laws.”  “If you know about God,” responded the sage, “that is all that can be known.  You don’t need to know anything more.  If you know Him, you know all.”

Amongst those who are attracted by the spiritual side of life, or perhaps it is better to say, amongst the spiritually restless, there is often an assumption that there exists, somewhere, a body of secret knowledge.  Such wisdom, usually cryptically encoded, is always in the possession of someone mysterious who is capable of miraculous wonders, a shadowy person difficult to find, living of course in some wilderness on the other side of the planet, and never–never!–in the house next door.  No doubt the question placed before the Chinese sage came out of this kind of belief.

Sitting outside of the story–for who would want to identify themselves with this curiosity-driven westerner?–it is easy to see that the seeker has only a concept of God; he has not yet made God a reality, as Sufism teaches us to do.

“But,” the seeker might protest, “the question is natural!  Throughout history there have been illuminated souls–but they don’t reveal to us what they know!  I have read so many books, from so many different traditions, and still I don’t know the SECRET!”

There have indeed been illuminated souls throughout history, and some of them, as a service to God and humanity, have done their best to put into words something of the infinite Truth. If their scriptures do not bring instant illumination, it is from both the limitations of the words and of those who read them.  Think of the tradition of love poetry, which is as old as the heart and human language:  those with a heart of stone receive nothing from it; on reading such poetry they do not fall headlong in love with anyone, whereas those who have really known love recognise very well what the words struggle to convey, for their heart vibrates in sympathy.

It is true that religion often conceals some aspects of the faith.  In the Jewish temple there was a veil protecting the Holy of Holies from view (the veil, some ten centimetres in thickness, that was supposedly torn in two at the moment that Jesus died), and in the temples of other traditions as well it is common that the most holy place is concealed from view.  We could understand this, though, as a symbolic teaching, telling humanity that the Divine, the Truth, is beyond form; you cannot see it plainly in front of you, but you must look for it within.

As we travel the path of understanding, we begin to learn that temples of brick and stone serve as symbols of the human temple.  That is why we sometimes repeat the words, “This is not my body, this is the temple of God.”  And wth that recognition also comes the realisation that if we wish to know the Truth, we must go deep within ourselves to find It.  That is the only knowledge that will satisfy our longing; it does not come from books, nor from exotic traditions; it comes from our core.

If it is ‘secret,’ then, whose fault is that?